API Design Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

API Design
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring API Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 20 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 283 298 361
Rank change year-on-year +15 +63 +64
Contract jobs citing API Design 106 56 45
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.58% 0.38% 0.23%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.68% 0.43% 0.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 62 28 34
10th Percentile £332 £404 £416
25th Percentile £362 £409 £476
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £485 £520
Median % change year-on-year -2.06% -6.73% -8.77%
75th Percentile £575 £597 £534
90th Percentile £622 £705 £583
UK median daily rate £500 £575 £534
% change year-on-year -13.04% +7.68% -15.24%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 0 0
10th Percentile £108.85 - -
25th Percentile £115.38 - -
Median hourly rate £119.00 - -
75th Percentile - - -
90th Percentile - - -
UK median hourly rate £109.00 £52.50 £65.50
% change year-on-year +107.62% -19.85% -

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

API Design falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 15,635 13,009 17,346
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 85.98% 87.13% 88.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,537 7,651 11,208
10th Percentile £220 £238 £250
25th Percentile £375 £381 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £476 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.80% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £530
% change year-on-year -4.76% -0.94% -3.64%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,774 755 1,215
10th Percentile £14.38 £15.50 £14.25
25th Percentile £17.30 £20.00 £17.72
Median hourly rate £23.02 £31.52 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -26.98% -29.17% +42.58%
75th Percentile £48.75 £63.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £68.00 £71.25 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £43.50
% change year-on-year -22.62% -25.29% +24.29%

API Design
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing API Design relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

API Design job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

API Design
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing API Design.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing API Design

API Design
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing API Design in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 20 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for API Design in the UK excluding London

API Design
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing API Design.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing API Design

API Design
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing API Design within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 20 December 2025. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
North of England -24 42 £463 -11.78% 26
North West +2 31 £402 -10.67% 17
Wales - 14 £456 -
Midlands -29 12 £358 -44.92% 7
East of England -12 11 £560 -25.33% 3
South West - 11 £600 - 2
South East -38 8 £513 +25.31% 12
Yorkshire -53 8 £475 -13.41% 7
Scotland +9 7 £543 -13.12% 2
West Midlands -27 7 £381 -41.35% 7
East Midlands - 5 £358 -
North East -5 4 £538 - 3
Northern Ireland - 1 - -
API Design
UK

API Design
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 8 (7.55%) Oracle Service Bus
1 8 (7.55%) Oracle SOA Suite
1 8 (7.55%) WebLogic
2 6 (5.66%) Anypoint
3 2 (1.89%) Confluence
3 2 (1.89%) Mule
4 1 (0.94%) Apache
4 1 (0.94%) Apache Airflow
4 1 (0.94%) CMS
4 1 (0.94%) Drupal
4 1 (0.94%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.94%) nginx
4 1 (0.94%) WordPress
Applications
1 4 (3.77%) Microsoft Excel
1 4 (3.77%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 8 (7.55%) Oracle BPM
2 2 (1.89%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (1.89%) Payment Gateway
Cloud Services
1 47 (44.34%) AWS
2 36 (33.96%) Azure
3 25 (23.58%) GCP
3 25 (23.58%) GitHub
4 21 (19.81%) Serverless
5 14 (13.21%) GitHub Copilot
6 13 (12.26%) PaaS
7 12 (11.32%) Apigee
7 12 (11.32%) AWS Lambda
8 11 (10.38%) Azure AKS
9 10 (9.43%) SaaS
10 9 (8.49%) Amazon ECS
10 9 (8.49%) Amazon SQS
11 8 (7.55%) Azure DevOps
12 7 (6.60%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 7 (6.60%) Amazon EventBridge
12 7 (6.60%) Azure Functions
13 6 (5.66%) AWS Fargate
14 5 (4.72%) Datadog
14 5 (4.72%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 5 (4.72%) HTTP
2 4 (3.77%) HTTPS
3 3 (2.83%) Firewall
4 2 (1.89%) AMQP
4 2 (1.89%) DSL
4 2 (1.89%) VoIP
5 1 (0.94%) Asterisk PBX
5 1 (0.94%) FTP
5 1 (0.94%) SSL
5 1 (0.94%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (21.70%) PostgreSQL
2 17 (16.04%) Relational Database
3 16 (15.09%) MySQL
4 10 (9.43%) DynamoDB
4 10 (9.43%) NoSQL
5 6 (5.66%) Amazon RDS
5 6 (5.66%) Oracle Database
5 6 (5.66%) RDBMS
5 6 (5.66%) Redis
6 5 (4.72%) Amazon Aurora
6 5 (4.72%) BigQuery
6 5 (4.72%) MongoDB
7 2 (1.89%) SQL Server
8 1 (0.94%) CockroachDB
8 1 (0.94%) Data Lake
8 1 (0.94%) Data Warehouse
8 1 (0.94%) DocumentDB
Development Applications
1 24 (22.64%) Git
2 16 (15.09%) Jenkins
3 9 (8.49%) GitLab
4 8 (7.55%) Postman
5 6 (5.66%) Maven
5 6 (5.66%) SonarQube
6 5 (4.72%) Gradle
6 5 (4.72%) SonarLint
7 4 (3.77%) Jaeger
8 2 (1.89%) Cucumber
8 2 (1.89%) JIRA
8 2 (1.89%) Spinnaker
9 1 (0.94%) Cypress.io
9 1 (0.94%) JUnit
9 1 (0.94%) Mockito
9 1 (0.94%) Visual Studio Code
9 1 (0.94%) webpack
General
1 34 (32.08%) Social Skills
2 20 (18.87%) Finance
3 15 (14.15%) Analytical Skills
4 14 (13.21%) Public Sector
5 5 (4.72%) Banking
5 5 (4.72%) Documentation Skills
6 3 (2.83%) Financial Institution
7 2 (1.89%) Law
7 2 (1.89%) Retail
8 1 (0.94%) Billing
8 1 (0.94%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 1 (0.94%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 31 (29.25%) Developer
2 21 (19.81%) Architect
3 15 (14.15%) Senior
4 14 (13.21%) Java Developer
5 9 (8.49%) Solutions Architect
5 9 (8.49%) Technical Architect
6 7 (6.60%) Consultant
6 7 (6.60%) Java Architect
6 7 (6.60%) Java Technical Architect
6 7 (6.60%) Oracle Consultant
7 5 (4.72%) Analyst
7 5 (4.72%) Business Analyst
7 5 (4.72%) Full-Stack Engineer
7 5 (4.72%) Lead
7 5 (4.72%) Oracle SOA Consultant
7 5 (4.72%) Senior Developer
7 5 (4.72%) SOA Consultant
7 5 (4.72%) Software Engineer
7 5 (4.72%) System Design Authority
8 4 (3.77%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 43 (40.57%) RESTful
2 39 (36.79%) Spring Boot
3 29 (27.36%) Spring
4 24 (22.64%) REST
5 23 (21.70%) OAuth
6 21 (19.81%) OAuth2
7 16 (15.09%) SOAP
7 16 (15.09%) Swagger
7 16 (15.09%) XML
8 15 (14.15%) JSON
8 15 (14.15%) JWT
9 12 (11.32%) .NET
9 12 (11.32%) OpenAPI
10 10 (9.43%) Kafka
10 10 (9.43%) Node.js
10 10 (9.43%) PyTorch
11 9 (8.49%) Hibernate
11 9 (8.49%) Semantic Kernel
11 9 (8.49%) TensorFlow
12 8 (7.55%) XSD
Miscellaneous
1 22 (20.75%) Cloud Native
2 9 (8.49%) Algorithms
2 9 (8.49%) Virtual Team
3 8 (7.55%) Distributed Systems
3 8 (7.55%) Product Ownership
4 6 (5.66%) Mobile App
4 6 (5.66%) N-Tier
5 5 (4.72%) Management Information System
6 2 (1.89%) Digital Wallet
6 2 (1.89%) Low-Code
7 1 (0.94%) Clustering
7 1 (0.94%) Data Protection Act
7 1 (0.94%) Data Structures
7 1 (0.94%) Greenfield Project
7 1 (0.94%) Hybrid Cloud
7 1 (0.94%) Legacy Code
7 1 (0.94%) Legacy Systems
7 1 (0.94%) Reference Data
7 1 (0.94%) Self-Motivation
7 1 (0.94%) TM Forum
Operating Systems
1 13 (12.26%) Linux
2 7 (6.60%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
2 7 (6.60%) Ubuntu
3 1 (0.94%) CentOS
3 1 (0.94%) Mac OS
3 1 (0.94%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 63 (59.43%) Microservices
2 57 (53.77%) Agile
2 57 (53.77%) CI/CD
3 46 (43.40%) Problem-Solving
4 34 (32.08%) DevOps
5 33 (31.13%) Containerisation
6 31 (29.25%) Test Automation
7 25 (23.58%) API Management
8 24 (22.64%) TDD
9 23 (21.70%) SDLC
10 22 (20.75%) AI
11 21 (19.81%) Software Engineering
12 20 (18.87%) Event-Driven
13 19 (17.92%) Mentoring
14 18 (16.98%) Computer Science
14 18 (16.98%) Machine Learning
14 18 (16.98%) Technical Leadership
15 16 (15.09%) Event-Driven Architecture
16 15 (14.15%) API Integration
17 14 (13.21%) BDD
Programming Languages
1 44 (41.51%) Java
2 29 (27.36%) Python
3 21 (19.81%) SQL
4 10 (9.43%) JavaScript
5 9 (8.49%) PL/SQL
6 8 (7.55%) C#
7 7 (6.60%) Kotlin
7 7 (6.60%) TypeScript
8 4 (3.77%) Rust
9 3 (2.83%) PowerShell
10 2 (1.89%) Bash
10 2 (1.89%) Bicep
10 2 (1.89%) DataWeave
11 1 (0.94%) C
11 1 (0.94%) Perl
11 1 (0.94%) Shell Script
11 1 (0.94%) VB.NET
Qualifications
1 25 (23.58%) Security Cleared
2 23 (21.70%) Degree
3 14 (13.21%) Computer Science Degree
4 11 (10.38%) SC Cleared
5 9 (8.49%) MCP
6 4 (3.77%) Azure Certification
7 3 (2.83%) AWS Certification
7 3 (2.83%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (8.49%) EU AI Act
2 8 (7.55%) NIST
3 7 (6.60%) QA
4 3 (2.83%) GDPR
4 3 (2.83%) PSD2
5 2 (1.89%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.94%) Accessibility
6 1 (0.94%) Disclosure Scotland
6 1 (0.94%) ISO 20022
6 1 (0.94%) ISO 8583
6 1 (0.94%) WCAG
System Software
1 42 (39.62%) Docker
2 1 (0.94%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 49 (46.23%) Kubernetes
2 19 (17.92%) Terraform
3 7 (6.60%) SCOM
4 5 (4.72%) Grafana
4 5 (4.72%) Prometheus
5 4 (3.77%) Ansible
5 4 (3.77%) Kiali
6 2 (1.89%) Istio
7 1 (0.94%) Cilium
7 1 (0.94%) Podman
Vendors
1 14 (13.21%) Microsoft
1 14 (13.21%) Oracle
2 9 (8.49%) Foundry
2 9 (8.49%) MuleSoft
3 8 (7.55%) Splunk
4 7 (6.60%) Salesforce
5 6 (5.66%) Gigya
6 5 (4.72%) Google
7 2 (1.89%) Dynatrace
7 2 (1.89%) NVIDIA
7 2 (1.89%) Pega
7 2 (1.89%) SAP
7 2 (1.89%) ServiceNow
8 1 (0.94%) Checkmarx
8 1 (0.94%) Databricks
8 1 (0.94%) Red Hat
8 1 (0.94%) Sitecore
8 1 (0.94%) VMware